"We cooked some coffee on the sterilizer" - December 30, 1942

Sgt. L.A. Winsauer
Div. Hq. c/o. APO 253
Camp Pickett, Virginia

Miss Jean Johnson
Sheboygan, Wisconsin

Wednesday Eve 12/30/42

11:15 P.M.

Dearest Darling,

'Lo again, Shorty — I'm over at the Dispensary again tonight, and now that the place has pretty well quieted down perhaps I can finish this letter without too many interruptions. I came over at about 8:30 to write, but about eight of the Medics were here and so we just sat around talking and listening to the radio 'till now. Lt. Welch brought his radio over to the Dispensary again so now we can at least hear a few good bands and get a little news.

This morning I got your letter that you wrote from the Foeste. Just some mail service we have — it was mailed on the 22nd and I didn't get it 'till today. That must have been quite a night, what with the weather, no cabs, and no ———— cabs.

Today's been another busy but monotonous day. The same old stuff — tall, short, fat, skinny, and medium sized G.I.s traipsing in all day with blisters on their feet, sore throats, hangovers, or just plain Goldbrick fever. Our Staff Sgt.'s on pass now so I had a lot of reports to make out too. We've got another headache now. In the last two days we picked up two new cases of gonorrhea in one of our companies and that's bad — it means a lot of extra work tracing them down and making out the darn reports. Our outfit had enough cases in the hospital the way it was, and now two more — Wow! I'd hate to be those gals when our venereal officer catches up to them.

Lt. Welch's gal from Michigan is down here now and he brought her over this afternoon. It did sorta break the monotony to see a chicken in the place — and she's quite a chicken too — blonde, with just some curves here and there. She's in dramatics or something at the University of Michigan. I didn't see them come in and he took her off into his office and let the door open, and then yours truly would have to screw up. One of the fellows had made an obvious mistake on an important memorandum and I would have to catch him right outside Welch's door and start giving him merry hell for it in none too gentle terms. When he started jumping around and making funny faces and pointed through the door I finally looked and caught on — but by that time it was too late. Boy, if that chicken didn't pick up a few new terms she's not the gal for Welch 'cause he's the kind of a guy who doesn't smoke, drink or chew. When he introduced me to her a little later I wondered if she knew I'd been doing the spouting off.

Anna May Wong’s Lady from Chungking was released on Dec. 21, 1942

I went to the show tonight with one of the fellows and saw a double feature — Anna May Wong in something, and also a mystery. Neither was much good. 'Came over here right after and got in on a bull session about nothing in general and gals in particular as usual. We cooked some coffee on the sterilizer about an hour ago, using some of the condensed stuff we brought in with us from the desert and it went pretty good.

Thanks a million, darling, for the bond. It was swell of you and as soon as I get organized I'll start sending some money to you each month to put with it in an account for us. I still haven't gotten any bonus, but am still "sweating it out".

Well darling it's agettin purty late so goodnight for now hon' and sweet dreams.

I love you,

Only Forever,

Louis